Oversight of defective products is directly linked to customer damage...The eyes of skilled technicians who support inspections

Recently, the problem of skilled workers with advanced skills and experience not being able to retire has been highlighted. Originally, the next generation of skilled workers should be trained and handed over to the next generation, but due to the declining working population and changes in employment patterns, companies are finding it difficult to secure successors. It is said that there are some things that make it difficult to continue.

In particular, it is often difficult to verbalize the know-how that skilled workers have accumulated over many years, so it is difficult to automate this with a system. Against this background, how to pass on advanced technology and experience has become an urgent issue for the manufacturing industry.

Company K, which has 3,000 employees and is positioned as a major company, manufactures and sells machine parts. The company's parts have a reputation for high quality, and are used in a wide range of products, from processing machinery used in production lines to general products such as automobiles and refrigerators.

“However, the Company also faced the same problem. Especially in the visual inspection process, the eyes of experienced technicians who find defective products play a major role in meeting customer quality requirements. If overlooks occur frequently, it may cause great damage to customers." (Company K)

Therefore, Company K tried to somehow inherit their know-how, but such technology is difficult to verbalize, and of course it cannot be incorporated into a manual. In the past, successors were nurtured through long practical experience, so to speak, "training," but now that labor shortages are becoming more serious and workers' awareness is changing, it is difficult to do so. That said, if things continue as they are, product quality and even business continuity will suffer.
“We are starting to hear voices of anxiety from people in the field, who seriously face quality every day, such as ``If XX is gone, we will not be able to maintain quality,'' ``There is no replacement for XX, but what will happen in the future?'' There was an urgent need for countermeasures.” (Company K)

人間の脳とAIが融合、少ない時間とデータで効率的に学習

So Company K turned to AI. We consulted with a certain vendor and conducted a demonstration experiment, but we found that it takes a considerable amount of time to make an AI learn a technology that requires tacit knowledge. Furthermore, because defective products rarely occur, the amount of usable data was too small, making learning difficult. As a result, we were unable to achieve accuracy that could be used in the field.

Therefore, Company K decided to consider another method, and at this time it came across Macnica 's ``Braintech'' technology, which fuses the human brain and AI. This solution, which utilizes InnerEye's AI products, can instantly read a person's decisions from their brain waves and have the AI learn from the results. Furthermore, by measuring a person's level of fatigue, concentration, etc. from brain waves and incorporating it into learning as a confidence level, learning can be done efficiently with less data.
“We focused on the innovative idea of directly importing the discrimination algorithm that is performed in the brains of skilled technicians into AI.Compared to conventional AI models, learning can be done with significantly less time and data, and accuracy is also improved. We thought that this would allow skilled technicians to quickly learn their tacit knowledge and automate visual inspections.'' (Company K)

In addition, Macnica carries a variety of devices that can be used in conjunction with InnerEye's AI. You can choose the device that best suits your usage scenario, such as goggle type, head-mounted type, helmet type, and earphone type. After evaluating these points, Company K decided to adopt Braintech.

Succession of eyes to find defective products is realized, connecting "tacit knowledge" to the future

Company K acquires the brain waves of skilled technicians from an electroencephalogram measurement device. We incorporate that judgment into AI and are working on inheriting the ability to find defective products, which has been an issue. At this time, even if there is little defective product data, it is highly evaluated that it can learn efficiently.

“In this way, not only can the skills and experience of skilled technicians be inherited, but automating it with a system also has the advantage of eliminating dependence on individual skills. In the worst case, it may lead to mistakes, but there is no such thing with the system.” (Company K)

Furthermore, at K's strong request, Macnica engineers are regularly present to provide support during EEG collection, helping to ensure that tacit knowledge is passed on to future generations.

Macnica continues to work on Brain Tech technology. Recently, we established the BRAIN AI Innovation Lab. (BRAIL) as an organization to create new added value through open innovation and promote the social implementation of Brain Tech technology. In addition to InnerEye's technology, we will advance projects and demonstration experiments through collaboration with universities and companies around the world to expand the scope of application of BRAIN AI. We will contribute to solving social problems such as improving productivity and resolving labor shortages.

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